Dodgers Digest Los Angeles Dodgers Baseball Blog
June 5th, 2022 Scoreboard
- Triple A Oklahoma City 4, Round Rock 2
- Double A Tulsa, San Antonio – Canceled: COVID-19
- High A Great Lakes 8, Fort Wayne 0
- Low A Rancho Cucamonga 6, Lake Elsinore 3
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Kyle Hurt had a stellar outing for Great Lakes:
It rained the entire game, but it picked up after the 5th, leading to a delay, and ultimately the game being called. Hurt is credited with his 4th win of the season, his first career complete game, as well as his first career shutout.
This outing was a tremendous bounce-back for Hurt, who had his worst outing of the season in the first game of the series. Last Tuesday, May 31st, the five earned runs Hurt allowed in his 1.0+ innings was more than he has allowed in his other eight appearances combined (just four).
If anything, it highlights how uncharacteristic it was for Hurt, who has been dominant otherwise, and it’s great to see him very quickly right the ship. As he turned 24 a week ago, and is 0.9 years older than average for pitchers at this level, a move up to Tulsa would give a better idea of what exactly the Dodgers swiped from the Marlins.
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Several Loons backed up Hurt’s performance with big days of their own.
First off, the daily Diego Cartaya highlight:
Cartaya also reached via a walk an an HBP, taking his opening week slash line at the High A level to .417/.588/.833. That’ll play.
Eddys Leonard also reached base three times, drawing a walk, and hitting a pair of doubles:
Leonard’s 16 doubles lead the Midwest League.
Sunday was Leonard’s 12th consecutive start at shortstop, which is notable because it has been a year since he started more than five consecutive games at the same position – he started 16 straight games at short for Rancho Cucamonga from May 19th – June 5th, 2021. With Leonel Valera being promoted to Tulsa, and both Jorbit Vivas and Alex De Jesus also needing time on the dirt, this might be less about committing to Leonard at short, and more about working with the players they have at the moment.
Speaking of De Jesus, he reached base twice, hitting a double and a triple:
De Jesus’ finished up his first week with Great Lakes with an OPS of .849. De Jesus split time evenly between short and third when he was with the Quakes, but this past week with Great Lakes, he played third base exclusively.
The lone homer from the rout came from Imanol Vargas:
Vargas went 2/3, raising his OPS to .889.
Vargas has been on a bit of a tear for a while now — over the last 30 days, he has slashed .338/.489/.648, giving him a Midwest League-leading 1.137 OPS over that timeframe.
Vargas will be 24 in a little over three weeks, and is 1.6 years older than average for the level, so it’s possible that a promotion is in the offing to see whether the Dodgers actually have something here.
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For Oklahoma City, Ryan Noda and Jason Martin hit back to back homers, which ended up providing all the offense they needed to close out the series with a W:
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Jake Vogel had the first four hit day of his career, hitting two triples and two singles for the Quakes.
Vogel, whom the Dodgers picked in the 3rd round of the 2020 draft out of Huntington Beach High School, had a rough 2021 season by just about every measure, but he’s showing some improvement in 2022. His strikeout rate is currently 24.0%, down from 29.9% last season, and his walk rate is 12.2%, up from 9.1%. That hasn’t translated into into sustained success on the field just yet, but he’s still just 20, a little over a year younger than average for the Cal League, and he is at least taking some small steps in the right direction.
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Huei-Sheng Lin was solid for the Quakes, picking up the W in relief of the rehabbing Clayton Kershaw. Who, by the way, had what appeared to be a successful rehab outing:
As for Lin, over 3.1 innings, he allowed one run on one hit, he walked two, and struck out five. Lin, whom the Dodgers signed out of Taiwan back in 2019, has now strung together three good outings in a row, logging 11.1 innings, allowing two runs on five hits, with 13 Ks and seven walks.
He reportedly throws a fastball that’s up to 95, along with a slider, curve, and a forkball. He also trained with old friend Hideo Nomo. Here’s a little video from last August:
Flat-plane four seamers and frisbee sliders, that’ll work. With Rancho heading up to Stockton this week, the game will be streamed, so it’ll be good to get a look at what he looks like now.
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Lastly, old friend Zach Reks hit a solo shot against his old club on Sunday:
Reks, whom the Dodgers traded along with Billy McKinney in November of last year to the Texas Rangers for cash considerations, is having a strong season at the plate, currently running an OPS of 1.108, though he scuffled a bit in a nine game major league stint with the big club (wRC+ of 41). Best of luck to him!
